Birth day, week, month?

I was working at the Indiana Department of Environmental Management when I first learned that a birthday could be more than a day-long event. Dana Reed Wise (no relation) was a beautiful, smart and fun woman who never had a nail unmanicured, a facial blemish or a dress-down day.

So when she announced it was her birthday week, I took it in stride as a Dana thing. She was fabulous day in and day out. She was, it turns out, also a trend-setter because everywhere you look now it's someone's birthday week or month.

Growing up, birthdays were remarked upon but not celebrated with a bounce-house, balloons and a theme. The them was you were one year older and still the annoying sibling to six other kids in a house with one bedroom. There was cake, for sure. And maybe a party, but when you have six siblings, it's kind of a party crowd every day. I'm not complaining, more explaining that the idea of stretching your birthday beyond the actual day of your birth was not something I grew up with. It was a think for kids. Adults might get a mention, or an event on a milestone year, but that's pretty much it.

Fast forward to the Year of our Lord 2024 and my birthday got started early and has yet to end. I'm in a whole other month now, but the hits keep coming. Sure, it's a milestone year, but it's a little out of hand. It started when Jeff thought he spied some large planters I'd been talking about getting since our yard was repaired from the massive sewer-pipe-related dirt pile.

Turned out we found the perfect planters, which even discounted were more expensive than I would have normally spent. But it was almost my birthday, and really, it was a home improvement investment... This picture doesn't do them justice, and they'll soon be filled with fall colors. They're ceramic, and heavy as our Poulsbo lunch (more on that later) but exactly what I'd envisioned.

I met some friends from my FOB days for lunch, and they remembered that my birthday was the very next day. As a result, I'm now the owner of some crazy soft slippers that Alison Reed is going to try to steal and super cute socks and cards.  

The day after my birthday, we flew to Seattle to spend some time with Christina Law, and then drove down to attend the wedding of our friends Sami Kahwaja and Lori Froese. The timing was coincidence; we paired the wedding with the drop-in because it seemed silly to spend the whole day flying and not see Christina.

Christina had gotten the birthday memo. She had birthday decor throughout her house and this great shot of us when we were 13, I think. I don't know what we were doing but I'm sure she was enjoying it despite the image...

She must have forgiven me because I'm still eating birthday chocolate. And we are both grateful for her home-made dark chocolate brownies, the remnants of which saved us when we got lucky to get on an earlier flight. It got us home sooner but deleted our airport lunch during the expected layover.

We had such a great time hiking and kayaking and just hanging around catching up. We went to the Saltair Beach in Kingston where we also had great pizza - thanks for the recommendations, Jesi! 

Big swatches of the beach was covered in a thick layer of kelp that looked like some huge ocean creature had feasted on it but then vomited it back out onto the sand. It was thick and super weird. It was deeply green and looked like slimy carpet. We spent about six hours waiting for what we thought was a peregrine falcon or hawk to leave his/her limb and snag some lunch. We gave up before it took wing. Might still be there. 

On the way to somewhere, we got into a deep, philosophical discussion for some reason. The Captain tried to explain the theory behind Schrodinger's cat to Christina, who is a very literal thinker and not at all shy about expressing her differing opinions. It was hilarious. 

I had forgotten that Christina has an issue with heights, but in my defense, it was her idea to trek up to Hurricane Ridge, which is part of the Olympic Mountain range and is breath-taking. More so if you're height-challenged, apparently. 

But the Brave Christina powered through it and got to the top. She didn't exactly celebrate up there and was noticeably happier as we approached the car. We'd been warned that it was cougar country, but the only wildlife we saw were lazy deer, that did not care about my birthday-week-month.

We somehow had perfect timing and got to the top of the ridge shortly before a thick fog/clouds moved in to obscure the view from those behind us. By the time we got down, you couldn't see anything but gray no matter where you looked.

We stopped in to say hello to Aunt Gudrun, who had no interest in our out-door adventures, which included kayaking in Liberty Bay. The bay is  part of the enormous Puget Sound and the Port of Poulsbo aka Little Norway, where Vikings are highly regarded.

I earlier indicated we had a heavy lunch after our kayak adventure. It might have been Norwegian now that I think about it. All I know is that it was not the first time we badly over-ordered. It worked out fine because we had a fine dinner and later, in Portland, had breakfast after being informed the sandwich we hadn't touched was actually better the next day anyway.

We left Poulsbo after kayaking with seals - some in the water around us and others loitering near the docks who didn't seem to have moved at all while we were gone.

We drove down to Seattle by way of Astoria, where I argued that the water we were crossing could not be a river because it was too big. I was wrong, and it was the Columbia River near its confluence to the Pacific Ocean.

We had a lovely lunch there and powered on to Lake Oswego, a gorgeous Portland suburb where we stayed for the next few days. Jeff made an essential craft beer stop, but we mostly hiked around local and nearby parks, some of which were along the Willamette River.

It was at Great Notion Brewing where we over-ordered again. We stopped at a different brewery and a few bottle shops in the city, too. The wedding and its pre- and post-activities were all great fun and bookended by trips to the hotel hot tub.

We were really pleased to be included in the fest and to meet more of Lori and Sami's friends and family. A lot of the friends were in the energy efficiency business, so there was plenty of "Oh, do you know XXX or YYY?" And sometimes we did!

All in all, it was a terrific eight days or so. Thanks to Lori's good planning, we had two days at the end with no work obligations, though they are threatening.

But in just four days, we'll have Jen and Ali Reed here in preparation for a weekend in French Lick with a bunch of some of my favorite girlfriends. We will lay around the pool (weather permitting) maybe take in the waters for which the area is world famous. One highlight is a chocolate train through or nearby the Hoosier National Forest. It's going to be great. 

Jeff is having a beer share while I'm gone, and our friend Ed Kaufman is spending some time with us, so he'll be well-entertained in my absence.

My guess is that come September 9, my birthday-week-month will come to a close. As well it should. I think I've more than made up for less-than-over-the-top birthdays in years past. Even the dahlias are getting excessive.